Information about plastic recycling

Once you place your plastic products into the recycling bin, have you ever found yourself wondering what happens to the recycling efforts that you make?

For those who don’t know, recycling is not an easy process. The procedure included in it is pretty complicated and long winded. Before a recycled item can be reused, it is put through extensive sorting, cleaning and melting. A majority of recycling centers out there utilize what we term as a single stream recycling system. For this system, it is necessary for all recyclable goods to be collected at once. This includes plastic, metal, paper and glass etc. To initiate the process, all of these goods must first be sorted out.

For PET recycling, it is necessary for plastic goods to be sorted out by the type of plastic, that is, PE, PP, PET and ABS etc. The reason for this is that it is not possible for certain types of plastics to be melted together as they have different properties and melting points. Even if these plastics are melted together, the mixture will be very weak in terms of its structure. For this reason it is best that mixed plastic types are recycled separately.

In most cases, recycling centers are focused only on taking two particular types of plastic products. These include products made out of PET plastic and those prepared using HDPE plastic. Prior to sending off plastic items to the recycling center, it is highly recommended for you to conduct detailed research on their type so as to ensure that they will be accepted. If the item is unacceptable for the recycling center, there is a good chance that it will end up being thrown off into the landfill.

Once the plastic is sorted off on the basis of its type, it is common for some recycling centers to further sort it out on the basis of colors. The most desirable plastics are those that are natural, clear and white colored. This is because it is extremely easy for these to be dyed when used to produce other plastics. In case you send off a mixed colored lot of plastic items, the one thing for sure is that these will be dyed so that black plastic products can be produced. Try this website for further information in this regard and to get started with getting your plastics recycled.